This podcast episode featured Verla Fortier interviewing Luke Suddards about his community-building initiative for new dads called The Walking Dad Club. Luke, a 37-year-old carpenter from Essex living in southwest London, created the walking group after experiencing a lack of community connection as a new dad. The club meets every 1st and 3rd Sunday at 9:30 AM at District Cafe near Battersea Park, where participating dads receive free coffee before taking a 45-minute walk around the park with their babies. Luke also conducts interviews with dads called "The Talking Dads" to share their experiences and struggles, which include sleep deprivation and balancing work and family life. The club has gained popularity with both regular attendees and new participants joining each session, and Luke envisions expanding the concept globally for dads worldwide to connect in nature. The Walking Dad Club This year, my son became a father for the first time—and I became a grandmother for the first time! As a retired community health nurse, I was delighted to see my lovely daughter-in-law connect with every local resource available to new mothers. At the same time, I found myself worrying about how few community supports seemed to exist for my son as a new dad. New Moms Find New Moms My daughter-in-law is extremely resourceful and quickly tapped into her community. New moms tend to find other new moms, and many community resources are built with them in mind. What I could not find, however, were fun, welcoming community spaces designed specifically to support dads. My son Max did have a couple of dads from his “Baby Bump” prenatal class whom he met for a quick drink now and then. One of them was Luke Suddards, a 37-year-old carpenter and joiner from Essex. Can you imagine my joy when I heard that Luke was starting a Walking Dad Club for new dads and their babies at Battersea Park on the first and third Sunday of every month? The turnout has been staggering. Most of the men did not know each other before showing up, and new dads continue to appear every month. They meet at 9:30 a.m. at the District Café near Battersea Park for a free coffee, then head out together for a walk. The group just keeps growing. Why Start a Walk for New Dads? Luke had lived in east London during his twenties before moving to southwest London to be with his partner, Chelsea. They were looking for a flat and soon began thinking about having children. As Luke said on my podcast Your Outside Mindset, “There were two parts to this. I had physically moved away from a close-knit group of guy friends. And psychologically, I had moved on from where I was in terms of that young guy, going out and drinking and all the fun things you do in your twenties. A lot of my friends from east London were a bit younger, or they were older and had moved out of the city. I found myself in southwest London, enjoying it very much with my partner Chelsea, but I was lacking a community of guys in particular—people I could meet up with, often just on a whim, and chat with about random stuff.” “Not long after I moved to southwest London, we got pregnant, and finding this community was put on the back burner. Everything became about being a new dad, which was amazing. Still, there was this niggle in my head that I was missing out on sharing the journey with people in the same place as me.” “I had this idea for a group for dads that would have a low barrier to entry, because dads are knackered and short on time. Chelsea owns a café on the edge of Battersea Park, which is a stunning park and perfect for a walk with babies and prams. The idea was that we would meet at the café, get a coffee, and do a lap of the park together. I guess it was about finding a community that wasn’t already there.” These New Dads Are Flourishing Luke, who started this successful outdoor group for new dads and babies and my son Max are flourishing as fathers. I am not sure how much to attribute to the Walking Dads Club, but they both say they look forward to those Sundays. They love being with their babies, strolling beneath the trees with other dads in the beautiful park. When I was there, people stopped to take photos of all these young dads smiling and laughing with their friends and babies. It was an uplifting image for everyone. These walking dads are regularly connected to their local environment (green space) and connected to the dads around them while they are shaping their beliefs about fatherhood – their outside mindsets – it feels good to have fun outside under the trees with other dads and their babies. The Walking Dad Club Is a Play on “The Walking Dead” Luke brings a sense of fun to all of this. The name “Walking Dads Club” is a nod to the zombie series The Walking Dead, because, as Luke says, “that is how you feel as a new dad.” Although I never thought I would watch the series, I have now started because of Luke and the Walking Dads Club. As one reviewer says, the series is really about remaining human when everything familiar has disappeared. Survival becomes a metaphor for life: waking up each day, adapting, enduring loss, and finding a reason to keep going. In a world where tomorrow is uncertain, ordinary moments—a shared meal, laughter, music, or a safe night’s sleep—become extraordinary. Love, loyalty, and friendship sit at the heart of the message. Sound like being a new dad to you? Well done, Luke. He said he chose the name to appeal to dads his age with a similar sense of humour, and it is clear he enjoys the work, which he describes as both a hobby and something he loves to do. Easy to Do, Easy to Repeat and So Much Positivity A walk in the park with his baby, alongside another new dad and his baby, is exactly what my son—and so many other dads—need. When I asked Luke what surprised him most about starting the group, he said it was “the number of people turning up and how much people need this. There are regulars who come every week, and there are always new people as well. That is a healthy sign of a strong and growing community.” As we know from the green space research translated in my books, even five minutes outside near trees can lift your mood, give you energy, help you think more clearly, and support problem-solving. These new dads and their babies are getting 45 minutes of green-space goodness combined with meaningful social connection and laughter. It is a triple whammy. A Global Walking Dad Club Luke paints this picture of the future: “It is 9:30 a.m. on the first Sunday of the month, and all over the world dads are waking up, dusting themselves off, giving Mom a kiss and telling her to keep sleeping. They head downstairs, get the baby out of the crib, dress them, put them in the pram, walk to the nearby café, meet other dads, say hello, catch up, and all go for a walk. This is so easy to do, so easy to repeat, and there is so much positivity. I do not see why it cannot happen everywhere. It would be amazing to think of all these dads taking a walk at the same time.” For peer reviewed research on how your time spent in green space can change your mindset, balance your nervous system and your heart rate please go to verlafortier.substack.com and check out my books Take Back Your Outside Mindset: Live Longer, Stress Less, and Control Your Chronic Illness and Optimize Your Heart Rate: Balance Your Mind and Body With Green Space
